The Methodical Memory: Invention in Current-Traditional Rhetoric

4. Subjects and Objects: Logical and Psychological Models of Invention in Early Current-Traditional Rhetoric

4 Subjects and Objects: Logical and Psychological Models ofInvention in Early Current-Traditional Rhetoric Institutionalized composition instruction in American colleges has been carried on under a number of disciplinary umbrellas. During the eighteenth century, the classical texts ofCicero and Quintilian were commonly resorted to as sources of advice about effective composing . Twentieth-century teachers of composition relied on neoromantic organicism and Deweyan expressionism, among other things, as grounds for their pedagogical practice. Composition teachers have also appropriated findings from allied fields into their instruction; these fields include literary theory, linguistics, general semantics, communications, and cognitive psychology. However, none of these tactics has ever shaken the dominance over American composition instruction exerted by the theory of discourse now known as current-traditional rhetoric. Current-traditional rhetoric is a direct descendant of the work of the British new rhetoricians. During the greater part of the nineteenth century , their texts constituted a fundamental part of rhetorical instruction in American colleges.· George Campbell's Philosophy ofRhetoric and Hugh Blair'sLecturesonRhetoric were very popular in rhetoric curricula during the latter years of the eighteenth century and the first half of the nineteenth century, although Cicero, Quintilian, and other classical rhetoricians also appeared on many college reading lists. Blair's Lectures were included in the curriculum at Yale in 1785 and were widely read in American colleges throughout the nineteenth century. Blair was apparently still in use at a few schools as late as 1890. Campbell's work never achieved the popularity of the Lectures on Rhetoric. The Philosophy of Rhetoric was apparently deemed appropriate for more advanced students 56 Subjects andObjects 57 and was ordinarily read as a supplement to Blair. Nevertheless, it was in use at many American colleges throughout the second quarter of the nineteenth century, and it enjoyed some popularity as late as the 1880s. Richard Whately's Elements of Rhetoric was included in rhetoric curricula almost immediately upon its American publication in 1832, and it dominated those curricula throughout the 1850s and 1860s, remaining in use in some schools until about 1900. Warren Guthrie notes that Blair, Campbell, and Whately were "the rhetorical names which almost every student in the nineteenth century colleges knew, and these were the men to dominate American rhetorical theory through 1850" (1948, 61). During the middle years of the century, Campbell's and Whately's texts were ritually buried once a year by junior students at Brown-a sound enough index of their status as curricular institutions. But American teachers were not slow to sec that they had an up-todate rhetorical theory on hand in the new rhetoric. By 1855 a respectable number of American rhetoricians had appropriated British discourse theory into a series of textbooks that enjoyed success in school and college curricula.2 Many of their title pages suggest that these texts were intended for private study as well. The authors of these works held varying degrees of respect for their British sources. Some, like Samuel Knox, simply borrowed material from a variety of British authors to compile his Compendious System of Rhetoric (originally published 1802). Other works, like John Rippingham'sRulesfor English Composition (originally published 1809), demonstrated their author's organizational preferences while retaining much material borrowed from British rhetorical and logical theory. And still others, like Samuel Newman's Practical System of Rhetoric (originally published 1827), while still relying on British sources, demonstrated a good deal of originality as well as points of disagreement with its British authorities. But despite their derivative character, the first generation of nineteenth -century American rhetoric textbooks represented serious attempts to adapt the principles of British discourse theory into a form suitable for young or inexperienced writers. And although they differ from one another in format, these books are remarkable for their similarities, which might be traced to their influence on one another, as well as to their reliance on Blair and Campbell. Nineteenth-century authors were not so nice about plagiarism as later authors came to be, and so their mutual influence can be surmised from their tendency to quote and paraphrase one another, as well as from the similarity of the discursive precepts they advanced and the practical advice they gave.J Invention was alive and well in current-traditional textbooks written 58 The Methodical Memory throughout most of the nineteenth century, although it came under fire near the end of that period. Early current-traditional rhetoricians modified the inventional epistemology they...